


Abide With Me

by chamekke



Category: Life on Mars (UK)
Genre: Gen, Horror, My First Work in This Fandom, Other, Welcome to my mind, post-2x08 fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-30
Updated: 2010-12-30
Packaged: 2017-10-14 06:21:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/146305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chamekke/pseuds/chamekke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam has returned to 1973 for good. Or for bad.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Abide With Me

**Author's Note:**

> Sam (with a hint of Sam/Annie), set immediately after 2x08. Written for the All Hallow's Eve [amnesty challenge](http://community.livejournal.com/1973flashfic/tag/amnesty%202010).

His wardrobe options are regrettably limited, Sam reflects. A few shirts (mainly striped), five pairs of trousers, and two neckties. He selects a green shirt and throws it onto the bed, then goes into the lavatory to shave. Annie likes his face when it's smooth, and he wants to make sure that when they dance together tonight, everything will be perfect.

How is it possible, he wonders, that everyone has forgiven him so quickly for working with Morgan? He isn't sure that he wants to probe the question too closely, but it nags at him. He is amazed and grateful at Gene's acceptance, Ray's good will, Chris's respectful apology. And most surprisingly, perhaps, Annie's flush of pleasure and ready agreement to Sam's suggestion of a night out on the town.

He gives his chin a last careful swipe with the razor. The face in the mirror is calm and confident. It's hard to believe that today is still the same day that he betrayed his team. The day (the month) in which Sam has lost everything he once thought he cared about, and then found his way home to where, thanks to a miracle he doesn't even understand, he is truly loved and respected.

As he fastens the buttons on his shirt, Sam imagines Annie's fingers unbuttoning it later, her fingers moving down his chest, softly exploring. His eyes are half-closed.

"Sam."

The childish voice is familiar. Sam turns around, sick with dread. The little blonde girl is beaming at him, her clown doll dangling from one small hand.

"You've decided to stay. I'm so glad," she chants, gliding closer.

The air in the room darkens and throbs with red. Sam is shivering now.

"When you go away, I feel sad."

"Go away!" Sam screams. "Leave me alone!"

Rage wells up in him, flooding out every other feeling. As the girl advances, Sam finds himself moving towards her for the first time, arms outstretched to push her away. _Force her out of my life forever_.

As he takes hold of the child's shoulders, she smiles up at him. Sam reels as his vision suddenly blurs and dims. He gasps, trying to catch his breath, his stomach cramping. His body feels tight, painful, as though it's folding in on itself. At once he becomes aware of a new tightness around his neck and waist. The figure in front of him swells, darkens, and towers over him. It drops the thing that it was holding and takes him by the shoulders in a powerful grip. Then it kneels down to gaze into his eyes.

Sam finds himself looking into his own face. It grins with triumph.

"That's a good girl, now," the alien mouth says softly.

Sam raises a hand to his crown and feels velvet tightness there. As he looks down, his vision clears, and he sees with a shock: small patent-leather shoes, a simple plaid skirt, a crimson blouse with a white peter-pan collar. He moves his foot, and one of the tiny shoes _moves_. At this he struggles to speak, but his throat is tight, his lips won't part. He is mute and struggling as one alien hand comes down, bends his left elbow into an angle, and tucks a soft mass under his arm.

Then strong arms lift him over to the television set and DROP him, and Sam falls, falls endlessly, falls to pieces, like sand drifting down an hourglass, sifting back into existence again: small, terrified, alone.

He finds himself in a void, a tiny space, no larger than a closet, filled only with a blackboard and high table. The mass under Sam's arm slips to the ground and he realises with a shock that he has been clinging to the clown doll. He looks away from the blackboard and sees a massive curved expanse, hard and glassy. Beyond it is the image of his room, unimaginably gigantic, the furniture distorted by the curvature, and in front of it all stands the creature, huge beyond belief. Its face, so alien, so familiar, moves forward.

And Sam watches behind his curtain of blonde hair, trapped, immobilised, as the alien Sam touches the screen and speaks again.

"Stay. Here. Forever."

The creature stretches and stands. Sam watches, helpless, as it plucks the leather jacket from the bed and shrugs it on, then tugs it neat with slender, masculine fingers. Looking over, it adds: "Don't worry, Sam. I'll take good care of your friends."

And at that the creature smiles, runs a hand through its short hair, and walks jauntily through the door.

Sam feels himself bending down, sees his bare arms lifting the clown doll up. For some reason it takes an immense effort, standing on tiptoe, the shoes pinching him terribly, the skirt straining, to restore the doll to its rightful place on the table. Small pink hands reach for the chalk. He places one piece carefully at the clown's foot, keeps the other clutched tightly in his right hand. The chalk cuts painfully into his palm. He lifts the chalk to the board, poised to make the next move, knowing that he can't afford to make a mistake. He's not sure whether he's a nought or a cross, actually, but he thinks the answer might come to him eventually.

And Sam feels his lips curving, unbidden, into a Mona Lisa smile, as he turns his face toward the door of his flat and waits. For Sam.

For anyone.

For ever.


End file.
